Self Forgiveness Self Empowerment: Escaping Our Homemade Prisons

I didn’t do it. I didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not my fault.

It’s true.

That is true, but what happens to us (trauma/family history) builds a narrative. It builds pathways in our brains. It creates beliefs, reactions, patterns. We can create our own personal prison. We may even like our prison. Our people may even be in the same prison with us.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) attempts to guide a client to these negative beliefs (thoughts), and tackles them with replacement beliefs and thoughts. It can take a lot of time and effort to uncover, and then rebuild these beliefs. Thoughts affect feelings affect behavior. To change the behavior, figure out the feelings, figure out the thoughts, change/replace the thoughts. It can be tedious when you don’t have a clue what you’re thinking. Even more tedious, when you know exactly what’s going on, but you can’t get past it. You can’t get out of the prison.

It is entirely appropriate to grieve when a loved one dies or is sick, but for how long? It is entirely appropriate to be angry when your spouse cheats on you, but for how long? If the events fit our narrative, then it can reinforce our own prison. So, then what?

Self forgiveness is the ultimate tool for letting go. It isn’t rushing anything, it isn’t dishonoring any feeling that makes (or made) sense. It’s acknowledging what was helpful and necessary at one time, but it no longer serves me in the present and into the future.

Emotional Polarity Technique™ (EPT) takes CBT to another level–uncovering the negative belief fast, and then forgiving self for believing the narrative we created and kept alive even when it wasn’t good for us.

Self forgiveness is self empowerment as it releases us from our prisons. It makes us more aware of our beliefs so that we can let them go and bring into our life a new story full of love, forgiveness, and joy. Until one forgives themselves it’s nearly impossible to replace the prison pattern. We choose to hold on to it to protect ourselves from issues that aren’t happening anymore. We choose to hold on because we’re afraid a relationship might be broken or dishonored if we let our negative pattern go.

One way to reimagine your life is to take an inventory of your family history, and the current relationships that you have. Is there anyone who could be a mentor? Is there anyone whose path you can follow? If not, is there a past teacher or adult or even famous person that you look up to? See that a different story is possible in the paths that have already been laid, and focus on that.

Self forgiveness is paradoxical empowerment. To let go is to learn and grow. It is to honor, to be free, and to heal with a new narrative moving forward.